Saturday, January 05, 2013


CRISIS PREGNANCY CENTERS AND THE POSSIBLE FUTURE OF RIGHT-WING NULLIFICATION

The New York Times looks at crisis pregnancy centers, which steer women away from abortion, often with the encouragement of the government. Not much news here, but the story is a reminder of how easy it's been for Republican states to effectively nullify Roe v. Wade within their borders:
With free pregnancy tests and ultrasounds, along with diapers, parenting classes and even temporary housing, pregnancy centers are playing an increasingly influential role in the anti-abortion movement. While most attention has focused on scores of new state laws restricting abortion, the centers have been growing in numbers and gaining state financing and support....

Pregnancy centers, while not new, now number about 2,500, compared with about 1,800 abortion providers....

Thirteen states now provide some direct financing; 27 offer "Choose Life" license plates, the proceeds from which aid centers. In 2011, Texas increased financing for the centers while cutting family planning money by two-thirds, and required abortion clinics to provide names of centers at least 24 hours before performing abortions. In South Dakota, a 2011 law being challenged by Planned Parenthood requires pregnancy center visits before abortions....
It makes me wonder what will happen if, someday, the Supreme Court decides that there's a constitutional right to same-sex marriage. Will couples seeking marriage licenses (straight and gay, or maybe just gay) be required to undergo counseling that warns of the evils of homosexuality and the describes heterosexual marriage as the bedrock of civilization? Will some state actually try to compel gay couples seeking marriage licenses to at least undergo one session of gay-conversion therapy? And will conservative federal judges conclude that these are "reasonable" hoops to jump through in order to get married?

5 comments:

aimai said...

I doubt it. The only reason why abortion can be dealt with on a state by state basis is that the targeted group--women--are isolated, the procedure is time sensitive, and the medical facilities are few and far between. Crisis pregnancy centers exist but are ineffective in blue states with lots of facilities and education. Women who don't have to don't sit still for these lectures and lies.

Gay couples who can get married in another state, at any time, are not likely to sit still for a home state lecture. People routinely go to other states to get married but they very seldom go to other states for medical procedures. They routinely save up and take time off to get married but working women or women with family responsibilites can't take time off during the critical phase of the pregnancy to travel, stay in a hotel, and have the abortion in states with fewer restrictions.

The nature of marriage--optional (for one thing), eventually recognized all through the country under the full faith and credit clause--makes bottlenecks at any particular state house largely irrelevant. Couples will vote with their feet and return to their states after tying the knot somewhere else.

This simply isn't true for abortions.

aimai

Victor said...

I'm with aimai on this one - they can do this because they be womin-folk.

Should-be, God-fearin', husband-obeyin,' walk-a-few-steps-behind, speak-only-when-spoken-to, raise-the-kid-'n-home-school-'em-and-have-a-hot-supper-waiting, and spread-'em-when-their-man-tells-'em, womin-folk as fetal-ovens.

On the other hand, if people had legally started gay-marrying 30 years ago, and AIDS came along after, I could have seen some serious repurcussions.
They'd have stopped that in a nanosecond, and deported Haitian's at the same time - becuase, if you remember, initially, the thought was that AIDS was a disease exclusively striking gays and Haitians, and that straight people didn't need to worry.

But disease proved to be what love ought to be - an equal opportunity employer.

Examinator said...

Victor
I'm with you abortions should be equal opportunity. According to the Repub states that means enforcing against choice so I propose we Make abortions and gay marriage mandatory in Republican states. Therefore in lickerty split time we have their type of social engineering..... Oh yes a few less Teabagger extremists WOULD be a bonus.

Seriously it's interesting to note that patient zero for Aids came from commercial vaccine experimentation on blood from baboons (some infected with mutant form of SIDS) then passed on unknowingly to locals in Africa by Whitey in the 1930's?
In which AIDS is then a case of lack of knowledge, Commercial Medical Colonial arrogance (CMCA).

Philo Vaihinger said...

Liberal media are responding to Heller by outing gun owners. Not really in the same league as what the GOP does to discourage abortion, but you see the point.

Steve M. said...

Liberal media are responding to Heller by outing gun owners.

Not "liberal media" -- one media outlet, which has been criticized even by Democratic politicians.

(I'm against it as well -- it does nothing to keep us safer, and it just raises the level of righteous indignation among gun owners. And maybe they're right that it endangers them, or endangers those outed as non-gun owners, though I would think we'd have already seen an uptick in crime if that were the case -- if you're a criminal, why wait, if this provides such a golden opportunity? No matter -- it's just not worth it.)